You Must Remember This
by WRTRD
Summary: In 4x21, "Headhunters," Castle and Beckett are compelled to do something they're loath to. Complete.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N** A friend forwarded me a prompt from Lou (inky coffee) on Twitter: Circumstances force Caskett to share a Knockdown-style "fake" kiss during the 47 seconds arc.

 **Disclaimer:** The only part of _Castle_ that I own is the TV on which I watch the show.

FUBAR. Everything is totally FUBAR. Rick Castle remembers the first time he heard that. It was during his brief aviator-craze phase, when he was eleven and living happily with the delusion that his father was a spy pilot. That's what guys said, apparently, when they flew dangerous missions. "This situation is FUBAR!" He'd felt daring just thinking of such a thing.

He doesn't feel daring now, just mad. Mad and depressed. "This situation is FUBAR," he says bitterly into his drink. The drink he's drinking alone at home at nine o'clock. In the morning.

"Give me an F!" he shouts, even though it makes his head hurt.

"FUCKED!" he shouts back, since there's no one else to do it.

"Give me a U!" he yells, a little louder.

"UP!" Moving right along.

He swishes the liquor around his flannel-lined mouth. "Give me a B!"

"BEYOND!" he responds bitterly.

"Give me an A!"

"ALL!" He nods.

Finally, "Give me an R!"

"REPAIR!" comes as a full bellow.

Two weeks. Everything has been fucked up beyond all repair for two weeks, and there's no way out of the mess. This close. He and Beckett had been this close, and in however long it takes to say "I was shot in the chest and I remember every second of it"—he actually does know how long it takes because he timed it: four seconds—they were suddenly as far apart as the Arctic and Antarctic. That's how it feels, too, even two weeks later. Cold, ice cold, and they're a world apart. Last week she'd acted as though he'd committed a capital crime by coming to the crime scene with Jacinda, and later she wouldn't even give her credit for almost cracking the case. She'd been furious because he'd shown his date a little police information. But what had Beckett done? Gushed all over that Limey bastard detective as if he were 007, that's what. And then there was the dress, the slinky velvet killer that she couldn't possibly have taken a deep breath in when she'd gone undercover with him. She didn't have to wear that. She could have chosen something less revealing. Like with straps to hold it up, for God's sake. She had on those pearl drop earrings, too, practically dripping onto her bare-naked shoulders.

The bottle of Scotch is right next to him, and he refills his glass. She'd lied! She'd lied to him, goddammit. All these months when he was supposed to be waiting for her, when he did wait for her, for what? For her to say sorry, sucker, I have no interest in you after all? Because it turns out that she does remember what he'd said to her in the cemetery, with a bullet freshly lodged in her chest. He'd told her that he loved her, and she'd never acknowledged it. Until two weeks ago, when she'd yelled at some little snot in interrogation that she has total recall of what happened when she got shot. But she's never told him, not him, and he'd asked her last spring.

Maybe he should be grateful that he knows. Knows that it's over. Technically there never was an it, just the hope of one, but he'd been so sure. Yeah, he's really fucking grateful. She might have kept him hanging for years. She might not have told him until he was tottering down Broome Street on his walker, wearing a cardigan stained with yesterday's lunch, and maybe drooling a little. So he can move on now, while he's still steady on his legs and has a full head of hair with not a strand of gray.

He has moved on, which is why he's drinking at breakfast time. He moved on a couple of days ago when he went in search of a new partner, and found one in Detective Ethan Slaughter. Except that the guy—known by other cops as The Widowmaker because his last three partners have died on the job—turns out to be certifiable. Insane. Violent. Must have had his teeth knocked out or chipped in some brawl because he has caps, terrible caps. At least Castle doesn't have to worry about leaving a widow behind, but if he gets killed working with Slaughter the lunatic can add Orphanmaker to his résumé. Alexis will be an orphan. Good thing she just turned 18 and won't have to go live with Meredith.

Last night he'd gone out drinking with the aptly-named Slaughter, and he's paying for it now. His head is exploding and imploding. Is that possible? Apparently, yes, it is. He takes another sip of his Scotch. Hair of the dog. This is his second drink, so it's hairs of the dogs now. Maybe he should just leave the NYPD behind him, chalk it up to experience, and get a dog. He could start a new series of books about a dog. A police dog. He could shadow someone in the K-9 unit. Still the NYPD, but he'd never run into Beckett.

He'd tried to be nice to her, cordial anyway. He'd brought her a coffee like the old days, but she'd iced him out when he asked for just a little help with Slaughter, and gotten furious when they used an interrogation room at the Twelfth. And the guys? He'd asked two tiny, tiny favors: to run three names and a Texas license plate. Espo had agreed only if he got front-row seats at a Knicks game and Ryan had demanded the Ferrari for a weekend. What kind of camaraderie is that? But he's stuck, crushed between a Sisyphusean boulder and a hard place. The hard place being a wall of NYPD blue. He doesn't want to go back to work the severed-heads case with Slaughter, but if he doesn't he looks like a wuss. So he'll see this through and then call it quits. But first he has to sober up and take a shower and put on clothes that don't smell of terrible cigars and even worse booze.

The trouble is, he's in love with her.

Kate Beckett is very glad that she's not working a case at the moment but instead prepping for trial, something she could do almost on automatic pilot. It means that she can sit here in the break room alone most of the time, moping and beating herself up. Why has Castle turned on her? What did she do? What happened? She'd been about an inch away from making the big leap with him two weeks ago when he'd vanished, right after the bombing case. When he'd come back he'd reverted to the appalling, egotistical playboy who had walked into her life three years earlier. Over time she'd decided that that had been a front, a publicity stunt, and she'd watched the real Richard Castle emerge—smart, funny, kind, even if he still drove her crazy on occasion. But maybe that wasn't the real Richard Castle, because now he's in the thrall of the God-awful Ethan Slaughter, scourge of the Gangs division. She's hurt and confused and mad, but her dominant emotion is fear. She's really, really worried about Castle. He's riding with the most dangerous member of the NYPD, a boor and a bully who's completely without scruples. A man who will eat Castle alive if he doesn't get him killed first.

She shudders, and not just at the thought of Slaughter putting Castle in mortal danger. She's sipping on abominable coffee because she can't bear to make the good stuff in the espresso machine that her partner, her former partner, had bought for the department. She's not even using her favorite blue mug, but some clunker made of inch-thick china that'd she found in the back of the cabinet. It has a chip on the rim, a stain on the bottom, and GO, BOSTON! on the side. She hates Boston, home of the Red Sox. The only place Boston should go is away. Bad coffee in a bad mug suits her mood.

She'd talked to Dr. Burke, but it made her feel even worse. She must have done something to make Castle give up on her, mustn't she? Because it happened: boom. Just like that. She doesn't get it. She doesn't understand any of it. She pours the cold remains of her coffee into the break-room sink and walks to the ladies' room where she locks herself in the corner stall and cries. After going through an entire pocket-pack of Kleenex, she waits to make sure no one else is there before she emerges and washes her face. She's about to reapply her makeup when she takes a hard look at herself in the mirror. She leans in, turns her head left and right. Forget it. Just forget it.

"Beckett! Hey!" Ryan whispers urgently, waving her over to his desk. "Gates has been looking for you. She wants to talk to you now—like ten minutes ago now."

Shit. "She say why?"

"Nope. But be careful in there. She looks like she's on some new kind of warpath."

"Okay. Thanks." Whatever this is, it can't be good. She arranges her face into a mask of passivity and heads for the Captain's office.

"Man," Ryan says, rolling his chair sideways until it bumps Esposito's. "Did you see that?"

"What?"

"Beckett."

"Yeah?"

"You didn't notice?"

"Notice what?"

"Something must really be wrong." His voice drops. "Seriously. She's not wearing any make-up."

Beckett knocks on the door jamb. "You wanted to see me, Sir?"

"I did," Gates glares. "And I do. Shut the door and sit down, Detective."

"Is this about the trial, Sir? Because I'm up to speed. I'm ready. No problem."

"No, this is not about the trial. Although it's a trial to me."

Say what? "A trial?"

"This is about your partner."

"My partner?"

"Detective Beckett, am I not enunciating clearly?"

"No, Sir. I mean yes, you're very clear."

"Your partner. Mister Castle."

"Oh. Well. Uh, we're not partnering at the moment. I've been working on this trial prep and he's been working with—with someone else."

"I'm aware of that. Painfully aware."

So am I, Beckett thinks. Pain that you can't imagine. "Right. I guess you saw him here with Detective Slaughter." The dead couldn't have missed that scene, Castle and Slaughter storming into the precinct.

"Using my interrogation room."

Ah, so that's what this is about. "Sir, I spoke to him afterwards. I made it very clear that it was not his place to do that. It won't happen again."

Gates waves her hand dismissively. "As you know, Mister Castle has a special relationship with the mayor."

Beckett looks a question, but doesn't ask it.

"One of the mayor's top priorities is reducing gang-on-gang violence."

"Yes."

Gates sighs and taps a pencil hard on the alarmingly clean top of her desk. Beckett wonders if the control-freak captain dusts it every day. Sprays Windex on it, maybe. It's so shiny. "This case, the one that Mister Castle and Detective Slaughter are working on, is one of the worst. Two gangs, the Westies and the Trenchtown posse, are at war over controlling Morningside Heights. The severed heads." Even someone as tough as Gates can't hide her revulsion. "The severed heads are those of three Trenchtown members. The man who was shot to death when he had the heads in his possession is Michael Reilly, the son of Brian Reilly, one of the Westies' top enforcers."

"I understand, but I'm not sure how our precinct or I come into this? It's not our case or our jurisdiction."

"True, Detective. I'm sure that the name Finn Rourke is familiar to you?"

"Yes, head of the Westies."

"And with whom you had some," Gates pauses, as if she's searching for the proper word, "dealings in a case two years ago? I heard about it at the time, of course, and earlier today I read the case notes."

One of the worst cases of her life. She can't bear to revisit it and her expression must give her away.

"I'm sorry to bring it up, Detective." Her voice is noticeably softer. "Because of the link to your mother's murder. Do you need a moment?"

"No, sir."

Gates gives her one, anyway, before continuing. "It seems that Finn Rourke is something of a fan of yours."

"He is?" Beckett can't keep the shock from her voice.

"Yes, because you solved the Jack Coonan homicide. Jack Coonan was like a son to him, and he's very grateful that you brought down his killer."

"That I shot him to death, you mean."

"Well, probably that, too. I think Mister Rourke's idea of justice is quite different than yours and mine."

"No kidding." She immediately regrets having said that. "I'm sorry. I meant no disrespect. That case was especially hard—it was too close to home in every way. I even shot Dick Coonan here. Almost in front of my desk."

"Again, I apologize for bringing it up, but my hands are tied. I have my orders from One PP and from the mayor himself."

"Orders?"

"To put you on the Michael Reilly homicide."

"What? Slaughter's and Castle's case? Please, Captain, no."

Gates has her hand up, palm outwards. "I have no choice. I was informed late last night—and this is strictly confidential—that Finn Rourke has been meeting secretly with the mayor about trying to rein in gang-on-gang violence."

"And the mayor trusts him on that? The fox in the hen house, it sounds like."

Her superior officer ignores the comment and keeps going. "As you may also remember, the Westies are dead set against drugs, and drugs are another high priority of the mayor. The Westies may not shy from most things, but they draw the line there. And Trenchtown is making drugs one of their specialties."

"I still don't see—"

"Hold on. I'm getting there. The detectives who work Gangs have a little more leeway than those in most other divisions, but even by Gangs' standards Slaughter has gone too far on more than one occasion. Witness intimidation, endangering the lives of citizens as well as fellow officers, excessive force. Especially the latter. He's facing serious charges at a civilian review board ruling next week."

Beckett pales and she feels her stomach lurch. "Oh, my God, Castle."

"Detective Slaughter has not been taken off this case, it's his. Despite his methods, he is in many ways a fine detective. He has a deep knowledge and understanding of gangs, maybe more than any one in the division, but the mayor and the police commissioner are concerned because this is a high-profile case and the media are all over it. The mayor in particular is concerned that Detective Slaughter will go over the top and that would, among other things, have serious repercussions on the gang-violence discussions. So: at the request of the mayor and the commissioner, I'm putting you on the case. With a proviso."

"So I'm replacing Castle?"

"No, no. That's the proviso."

"I'm sorry, I don't understand."

"You'll work with Mister Castle on the case, but Detective Slaughter will not be told. As far as he's concerned, he's 'running and gunning,' as he likes to say, with his new sidekick, Rick Castle. You will have to be very discrete. You two have the highest closure rate in my precinct, and if you put your heads together you should be able to crack the case before Slaughter cracks any more heads."

"I won't be riding with them, then."

"No running and gunning, that's right. But I trust that you will be in the, uh, vicinity."

"What, you mean tailing them?"

"Yes." Gates picks up a fat manila folder and passes it across her desk. "This will get you up to speed."

"What about the trial I've been prepping for? I have to testify."

"That shouldn't be a problem. There's been a one-week postponement."

"By?"

"That's above your pay grade and mine, Detective. Now, if you have no other questions, I have a great deal to do, and you have some heavy reading."

"Yes, sir."

Beckett leaves and goes back to the break room to think for a few minutes. The upside is that maybe she can keep Castle from getting killed. That downside is that he's going to hate this. He obviously doesn't want to work with her, and now she's supposed to be, what, a spy? She buries her hands in her hair. "Just do the work and close the damn case, fast," she mutters. She'll just have to be cool. Detached. Unemotional.

The trouble is, she's in love with him.

TBC


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer:** The only part of _Castle_ that I own is the TV on which I watch the show.

 **A/N** Oops. Not a two-shot after all.

It's a good thing he'd put the razor down before picking up his phone or he'd have given himself one hell of a nick. He'd wanted to check his Twitter feed, as he does when he needs to give his spirits a boost. It probably would have, too, but for the fan who was going into Smacksy's Bar last night just as he and Slaughter were leaving. RookRocks had taken a photo of the two of them propping each other up, looking like the back end of a garbage truck. He'd posted it with the caption, "Hey, Nikki Heat, your guy is totally wasted. Who's his date?" Castle's 3.25 million followers are rushing to comment, not that he's going to look. He wishes that he had only 3.25 followers, though how would that work? Maybe three followers, one of whom is ten weeks pregnant?

He's still standing at the sink. His phone is off, but that appalling image is seared into his brain. If the mirror is to be believed, and it almost certainly is, he doesn't look much better now than he did last night, but at least he's standing upright and doesn't reek. If he had the nerve, he'd consider using the razor to slit his throat. Instead, he gets dressed, makes himself some coffee, and turns his phone back on. Slaughter will be getting in touch, and he'll have to answer, God help him.

Beckett is still in the break room. She's going to have to tell Castle, but when? And where? Ordinarily she's a good bullet-biter, but there's nothing ordinary about this. She hasn't a clue how to approach him, and she's a wreck. Maybe if she put herself in his shoes? Or put herself in his mouth? No. No, no, no, that's not what she means. What she means is that she'll eat something that he likes to eat when he's with her. Oh, God, if he could read her mind right now. She often suspects—used to suspect—that he does. Did.

To steady her nerves, she gets up to make some coffee with the luxury beans that he supplies for the luxury machine that he also supplied. While it's brewing, she shoves a handful of change in the battered vending machine and buys his favorite workplace snack, a Milky Way Marshmallow bar* and a bag of Cheetos. "Sweet and salty, gooey and crunchy," he likes to say. "Can't beat that combination, Beckett." Back at the break room table, she takes a tiny bite of the candy bar, and chews on a Cheeto at the same time. It's vile. Absolutely vile. But he loves it, so she'll try to love it, too, for whatever that's worth—even though she's afraid that everything is worthless now between them.

It turns out that if she chases the Milky Way-Cheeto mouthful with a good slug of coffee, it's almost tolerable. Still, after four bites of candy and cheesy puff things of a bilious orange hue, she's ready to gag, so she stops and stares at her phone. Text? Call? Go to the loft? No, no, and no. No, wait. Yes to the first, with a suggestion of a meeting place. It takes her several minutes and a chewed nail to compose an eighteen-word request.

"Could you meet me privately for coffee in half an hour, please? Just us. The place on MacDougal."

When her phone chirps, she drops it on the floor where it lands screen down. She retrieves it, flips it over, and warily checks the response with one squinting eye.

"OK"

That's it? "OK"? It's the shortest text in history from Castle, and probably not a good sign. She pushes herself wearily from the table, throws the rest of the vending-machine delicacies into the wastebasket, and returns to the Captain's office.

"Excuse me, sir."

"Yes, Detective," Gates says, looking over the tops of her glasses.

"I wanted to let you know that I'm going out to meet Castle. Just to talk to him briefly, see if we can make any progress on the case. I thought it best to do it away from the precinct."

"Good idea. You've already gone over the material I gave you?"

"Yes, sir."

"You're a remarkably fast reader."

"I try to be. Find it useful on the job, you know?"

"Yes, I do know." She takes her glasses off, laces her fingers together, and bumps them against her chin. "And you will impress upon Mister Castle that he is not to let Detective Slaughter know that you are in any way involved."

"I will. First order of business."

"All right then. Good luck." When she puts her glasses on again and looks down at the file on her desk, Beckett takes it as her unvoiced dismissal and leaves. On the way to the elevator she tells Ryan and Espo that she'll be gone for a bit to do something that Gates has requested. She's uncomfortable saying it, though it's not untrue. It's just not the whole truth and nothing but. She feels the same way about what she'd said to Gates. She is a fast reader, but she's barely looked at the file from the Captain. She doesn't need to because she's been reading, on the sly, everything there is on Michael Reilly's murder, as well as every detail about every charge that has ever been brought against Slaughter.

Deliberately arriving ahead of her meeting time with Castle, who is always prompt, she parks her car down the block from the cafe on MacDougal. She chose the place because it has sensational coffee and, more important, because at this time of day, in the pre-lunch lull, it's usually all but empty. There's also a high-back, two-person booth in the rear that's almost impossible to see from inside or out, and she grabs it. When the waitress approaches, she places their order and keeps her eye on the door.

She's two sips into her latte when he comes through the door. He looks fantastic, and he looks like hell. He's wearing a new sky-blue shirt—new to her, anyway, which probably makes it new since she mentally catalogues his wardrobe. For professional reasons. In case he's, say, taken captive and she needs to provide details on what he had on when last seen. It could be vital information. It's warm for mid-April and he's not wearing a jacket, which means that his biceps, triceps, and deltoids are visible. Not exactly visible—she can't actually see them, she doesn't have X-ray vision for crying out loud—but the play of them under the (presumably) soft cotton of his shirt is evident. Very evident. But he does look like hell. His eyes are bloodshot and there are dark circles underneath. He's moving like someone very old who's trying to walk through ankle-deep mud. What the hell, Castle?

He's sure that she'll be in that booth in the rear, and she is. She looks even more beautiful than usual, and she looks like hell. There's an overhead light that catches her cheekbones just so, and brings out some honeyed shades in her hair. But the most remarkable thing is her make-up: she's not wearing any. He's never seen her without it, except in the hospital the morning after she was shot, which doesn't count. Without it she looks freshly scrubbed and incredibly young. Open and vulnerable. He's not used to that, either. But she looks gaunt and exhausted, too, as if something's bearing down on her and crushing her, physically and emotionally. What the hell, Beckett?

"Hey, Castle." She summons a smile.

He slides in opposite her. "Hi."

"I took the liberty," she says, gesturing to two mugs of coffee and an enormous glazed doughnut, trying not to mind that he hadn't said "hey" to her. "Hi" was for everybody else.

"Thanks." He lifts his mug, takes a sip, and winces.

"Is there something wrong? Too hot? Oh, wait, too cold? Did they give you decaf by mistake? I'll get another—"

He puts his hand out, and unintentionally brushes her wrist. It feels like a jolt from a downed high-power line. "It's fine, Beckett. It's me."

"What do you mean, it's you?"

His entire body slumps. Even his face sags. "I had too much to drink last night." He slumps a little more. "And this morning."

"This morning?" Her fingers leap to her lips. "Sorry. Sorry. I didn't mean to be so loud."

"It's okay. I already yelled louder at myself."

"You never drink in the morning, Castle. You okay?" She's the one who winces this time. "Sorry, none of my business."

"I'm sure you'll hear about it, anyway."

No judgment, no judgment, no judgment. No jealousy, no jealousy, no jealousy. Keep it light, keep it light, keep it light. "You land in the drunk tank, Castle? Am I gonna have to get your record wiped clean?"

"Only if you can wipe Twitter clean."

If she could surreptitiously check it right now, she would, and as soon as they're out of here, she will. For now, she'll brush it off and maybe also get to the point of the conversation they're not yet having. "I'm not sure even Gates could do that, and she can do almost anything. You probably have a zillion followers."

"Three point two five million."

"Wow." And one, she doesn't add. 3.25 million and one. Her. Under an assumed name, of course. "So, um, Castle, speaking of Gates."

"Yeah?"

"She's the reason I wanted to see you."

His ego has taken a lot of blows lately, but this is the worst. "Oh."

He looks so hurt that ironically he's given her faint hope. Faint hope is better than none at all. Belatedly she wonders what he'd thought when she'd texted him. He must have found it odd, but he'd showed up. That's something. She extends the tiny tip of the tiniest leaf on an olive branch. "Not that _I_ didn't want to see you."

"You did?" He sounds surprised. And then his tone turns bitter. "Is that true?"

That's a metaphorical slap. "Of course it's true. Why would I lie?"

He just manages not to throw the question back in her face, but he takes a few moments to reply. "Anyway, Beckett. Gates. What about her?"

So much for the hope. Could this meeting get any worse? "She's put me—well not she, but One PP. One PP instructed her to." Oh, shit. "She put me on the Reilly case."

"What? So I'm off?" Anger and relief are dueling at twenty paces in his gut, pistols drawn, but he can't let her think that he's grateful. "Dammit."

"No, you're not off the case. I'm on it with you. As of this morning."

"So Slaughter's off?" And he and Beckett are a team again?

"No."

"Look, I have the hangover of the decade, and maybe I'm a little slow on the uptake, but does this mean that the three of us are working this homicide? Because I can't see that—. It won't work."

"It's the three of us, but not exactly. Let me explain." This isn't easy, not least because she's not allowed to reveal that Finn Rourke is working clandestinely with the mayor. "I don't have to tell you that Slaughter doesn't always play by the book."

"You hate him, Beckett."

"I don't. I dislike some of his methods and a lot of his attitudes, including the way he treats women, but that's not the point. The higher-ups are concerned about serious escalation of gang-on-gang violence, which is one of your friend the mayor's hot topics, and they want this case closed cleanly and quickly. The cleanly part is something Slaughter isn't interested in."

"So, what, you're supposed to sweet talk him into playing nicely?"

"No, Castle, I'm not going to talk to him at all. He can't know—and you can't tell him—that I'm working the case, even behind the scenes. You'll still be riding with him, and as far as he's concerned, it's just you two cowboys. What I'll be is your shadow. That's something, right? Me shadowing you?"

That should have gotten at least a little smile from him, but it hadn't. He's expressionless. "Shadowing me. As in following? Tailing?"

"Yes. But look, maybe it won't even come to that."

"How's that?"

"Because Gates is hoping that you and I can break this case on our own, just the way we have dozens of other times, only without Ryan and Espo. Whenever you can get time away from Slaughter."

"I dunno, Beckett." He runs his hands down his face and looks blankly at the wall behind her.

She doesn't know either, not really. But she's desperate for it to work and this might be her last shot. She's shredding the edge of her paper napkin. "Aren't you going to eat your doughnut?" she asks, pushing the plate towards him. "It's your favorite. Remember that time last year when you asked the manager if she had a secret, magic machine in the basement that injected warm air into the doughnuts? Because there was no explanation that you could think of, scientific or otherwise, for them being so light?"

"Weird that you remember that," he says, turning his eyes back to her. "It wasn't important."

"Sure it was. Doughnuts are very important to you."

"What about other important things, Beckett? You remember all of them?"

His question, questions, are laced with acid and shot through with everything from anger to disappointment. Something starts bubbling in the back of her brain. He's talking about something specific, isn't he? Before she can say anything, his phone rings. The music is familiar, but she can't place it. Castle reads her face well.

"It's 'Cowboys From Hell'," he says. "Slaughter's ringtone. He programmed it into my phone yesterday." He accepts the call. "Castle."

TBC

 **A/N** Thanks so much, everyone who's reading this, and I hope you don't mind sticking around a little longer. I'm terrible at estimating how long my stories are going to be. I outgrew chapter two, which is where I'd intended to end, so this will be a bit longer than I intended.

*The Milky Way marshmallow bar was not yet on the market in 2012, but I thought that it would appeal to Castle, so I'm exercising artistic candy license.


	3. Chapter 3

**Disclaimer:** The only part of _Castle_ that I own is the TV on which I watch the show.

She's trying to block out Castle's side of the call, which consists largely of "mmhmm," "huh," and "sorry, man." She's distracted, anyway, by what he'd said to her just before Slaughter called.

 _"_ _What about other important things, Beckett? You remember all of them?"_ He's so hurt and mad, and those two questions are like the lashes of a whip. For the last couple of weeks she's been trying to figure out what had gone wrong; every time she thinks she's close, she's not. Was it this? No. Could it have been that? No. What about the other thing? No.

"Beckett? Beckett?"

Castle's looking at her as if she were a stranger doing strange things. "Oh, sorry. I was just thinking about something. Sorry." She signals the waitress for more coffee. If she could just freeze-frame everything for a few minutes so she could concentrate on this. She's on to something at last, she knows. Castle would call it spidey senses; she calls it finally using her training as a detective. There's a virtual white board in her mind, and she's mentally filling in a timeline, putting up photos of persons of interest, suspects. There's a good, bad, chance, that she's Suspect Numero Uno. "So, Slaughter, huh?"

"Yeah."

The waitress is refilling their mugs, and Beckett waits for her to retreat. "You have to go meet him?"

"Not yet. He's going to the dentist."

Not much about Slaughter can surprise her any more, but that does, and her voice gives her away. "In the middle of a homicide investigation?"

"Emergency visit. Seems he tripped, slipped, something, after we left the—. When he was on his way home. He fell. Hurt a tooth. Teeth, actually."

"Got into a fight with the sidewalk and the sidewalk won?"

"Curb. The curb won."

"They can be tricky little devils, those curbs. My father had that happen a couple of times, back in the day. Before." She unconsciously runs her finger across the face of her watch. "His teeth were okay, luckily."

Castle grimaces. "I don't think it's the first time for Slaughter. Ever notice those caps? I'm guessing he lost a couple of teeth in falls. Or brawls."

She looks evenly at him. There's definitely a chink in the armor: for whatever reason, he's not as dazzled by The Widowmaker as he had been. Still, she has to be careful. "Well, since you have some time, maybe we could put it to good use and work on the case. Gates gave me the files." She hoists her bag and points.

"What, here?"

"No, not here. A little too public for that. We can't do it at the precinct in case Slaughter pops in and sees us. But we could use my apartment, my living room, could spread everything out there." She swallows hard. "If that doesn't make you uncomfortable." Oh, shit, he looks angry again.

"Why would that make me uncomfortable, Beckett?"

"I don't know, just. Listen," she tries to sound upbeat. "All this coffee, you know? I have to go to the ladies room. Be right back." She's got a bladder of steel, but she needs a few moments away from him and that was the only thing she could come up with in her state.

She stands just inside the door of the cafe's tiny rest room and goes over the timeline she'd been constructing in her brain. And then it happens, as so many awful realizations do. Maybe it was using coffee as an excuse to come in here, but something jarred everything loose. Coffee. The coffee he's been bringing her every day almost from the beginning. The paper cup with the plastic lid. Her legs feel so weak that she grabs the edge of the sink for support. In her mind, she's back in the bullpen, five months ago, and sees him at her desk. It's the end of the sniper case. She's been such a mess, and Castle has been so understanding. More than understanding, he's been kind. Really, truly, amazingly kind. With excruciating clarity, she recalls every second of that scene.

 _He says that he's been waiting for his partner. "Maybe you've seen her. Pretty girl, thinks she can leap tall buildings in a single bound, carries the weight of the world on her shoulders, yet still manages to laugh at some of my jokes."_

 _"_ _She sounds like a handful," she says._

 _"_ _Tell me about it." He smiles. "Anyway, If you do see her, tell her she owes me about a hundred coffees." After that, he goes home._

She glances at her reflection in the mirror over the sink, and turns her head away. Coffee. The Boylan Plaza bombing. Two weeks ago. She'd been grilling Bobby Lopez, hard. When she'd come out of the box and gone back to her desk, she'd found a cup of coffee waiting. She'd asked Espo if Castle was there and he responded that he had been but then said that he had to leave. Coffee. She owes him way more than a hundred coffees.

It's a cannonball to her gut. Another bullet embedded in her heart. A 500-pound wrecking ball against the side of her head. Castle had heard her tell Bobby Lopez that she remembered everything about her shooting. No wonder he'd taken off. No wonder he'd—. Fucking hell. That's why Jacinda. That's why Slaughter. She has just enough strength to walk two steps and throw up in the toilet.

Castle stares at the doughnut. It really is his favorite, and though he has zero appetite, the sugar will be good for him. He should have dumped a few teaspoons in his coffee, too. Why is she being so nice? He tears off a piece of the yeasty confection and chews it contemplatively, or as contemplatively as he can with his head-splitting hangover. She acts as though she really wants to work with him, which is weird. She'd been pissed when he'd told her about the way he and Slaughter had taken down the two guys in a brawl. Said he was a writer, not a cop. Thanks for the reminder, Beckett. And she'd almost torn him a new one when he'd let Slaughter use the interrogation room at the Twelfth. Huh. Maybe she had a point. A minor one, but a point. He has another bite of doughnut. She'd been pissed, but she'd been protecting him. Slaughter is a freaking madman.

Where is she, anyway? He turns in the direction of the rest room and sees that the door is still shut. She must have been in there at least ten minutes. Longer, probably. He finishes the doughnut and checks his watch. Five more minutes have elapsed, and the place is filling up with the lunch crowd. He's worried now, and just about to get up and knock on the rest room door when it opens and she walks out, her face the color of his paper napkin. The absence of make-up makes her pallor unmissable.

"You all right, Beckett?" he asks as she sits opposite him again.

"Yeah. Thanks. Just need some water."

"You look like a ghost, if you don't mind my saying so. Or like you just saw one."

"I did," she mumbles against the rim of her glass.

She must assume that he hadn't heard her. He'll leave it. For now. He watches her drink half the glass and straighten up.

"You ate your doughnut. Good."

"Yeah, it was good."

"I meant I'm glad—."

"I know."

She opens her bag, takes a $10 bill from her wallet, and sets it down next to her spoon. "What do you say, Castle, shall we go solve a murder?"

He shrugs. "Sure. Why not. Won't be the first time."

She closes her eyes very briefly. Please, please don't let it be the last. "No, it won't."

"You got a murder board at your place?" The instant he says it he wants to stuff it back in his mouth. What an idiot he is. Last year she had shown him the makeshift murder board of her mother's case, which she'd hidden on folding shutters in her apartment. It was right after Detective Raglan had been shot to death in front of them, while he was warming his hands on a mug of coffee and just beginning to confess his part in the death of Johanna Beckett. "Oh, God, I'm sorry. I wasn't thinking."

"It's okay," she says, the two syllables sounding like a bruise and making his heart contract. "I do, sort of. A couple of months ago I bought a small one at Staples. It's supposed to be a kitchen note board, but it helps me sort things out sometimes, when I get a loony idea in the middle of the night." They're on the sidewalk now, and she looks up and down MacDougal Street. "Did you drive?"

"No way. Took a cab."

"All right, then you can come in my car."

It's the quietest ride they've ever had. She's so shaken about her realization that Castle had heard her—. She doesn't know how to broach it. They're both floundering in this terra incognita, and it's terrifying. She hates it. But what's most important now is protecting Castle from Slaughter. The rest will have to wait.

Neither one says a word until they're inside her apartment. Once they lay out a few papers on her table, and begin making notes on her white board that's propped up on a small easel by a window, the ease begins to return. With suggestions and counter-proposals and some minor differences of opinion, they're inching back into familiar territory, or at least its outskirts.

"You know," he says, waving a short stack of paper, "reading about this scum Cesar Vales makes me hungry for Tex-Mex."

"Reading about the upstanding Michael Reilly doesn't make you hungry for corned beef and cabbage? How about the model citizen Malik Williams? He give you a hankering for curried goat?"

"Please, stop." He puts up his hands and grins. "May I remind you of my hangover?"

"Are you telling me that fajita burritos go down well with a hangover?"

"Now that you say it out loud, no. Forget it."

"I'm not really hungry either." She stands up too quickly, and feels light-headed. "I could use some coffee, though."

"You could always use some coffee, Beckett. It's your life's blood."

Her life's blood. Between them, yes. But her life's blood is also what was flowing out of her last May, through a hole in her dress blues and onto the green grass, seeping into the brown earth below, while he told her that he loved her. She wants to stand up for this. It's important. "You called me Kate."

What is she talking about? "I did?"

"You called me Kate, Castle. In the cemetery. I never told you that I remembered and I finally figured out, while we were in the cafe today, why you've been so angry with me lately. Pathetic that an NYPD detective couldn't do it sooner, isn't it? You heard me when I was questioning Bobby Lopez. I'm sorry."

He gets up from the chair he'd been perched on, but rather than move closer to her, he backs away, as all his rage and disappointment flood back in. "You're sorry? Eleven months later and you're fucking sorry? That's it?"

"No, that's not it. I want to explain, please."

"Explain what? What's there to explain? You heard me or you didn't hear me. That requires no explanation. At all. And especially almost a year later. And you know what really stings? That that little jerk learned it before I did."

"It wasn't almost a year." She's not thinking fast enough. She has to make him understand.

"It's April. I said it last May. That's almost a year. I don't know why I'm _explaining_ that, since it doesn't really matter now."

She's pleading. "It does matter, Castle. It does. I know you said it almost a year ago, but it was the end of summer before I was sure that you had. I'd been too doped up, in too much pain, too terrified. But I should have told you then."

"Damn right you should have."

"I should have told you, and then I should have asked you."

"Asked me? Asked me what?"

"If you still loved me."

"Is this a joke to you?"

"A joke? Do I look like I'm kidding, Castle?" She grabs her hair with both hands and pulls, hard. "You never said it again. I didn't know it you'd just said it in the heat of the moment. So I could die, I don't know, feeling loved."

"Why the hell didn't you say something?"

"Why didn't you?"

TBC

 **A/N** Thank you very much, one and all. Have a great weekend. I haven't forgotten the kiss, I promise.


	4. Chapter 4

**Disclaimer:** The only part of _Castle_ that I own is the TV on which I watch the show.

The muscle just below his left ear is twitching. "Oh, I think I said it again, Beckett. Many times. Not outright, not 'I love you' out loud, because you made it very clear that you weren't ready to hear it."

"I made that clear?"

"Crystal. Surely you haven't forgotten that conversation? We had it right after you came back in September."

"I haven't forgotten it, Castle."

"Good to know that your memory is functioning well. A healthy thirty-two-year-old woman should be able to remember everything."

He used his hands to make quotes around "everything." If she hadn't already known how angry he is, that would have told her. He hates air quotes.

"Yeah, well, maybe I'm not so healthy."

She's not healthy? She's sick? He feels as though he's been thrown through the ice into a deep, enormous lake and there's no ladder, no kind of life line for him to pull himself out. He forces a question past the bowling-ball-size lump in his windpipe. "You're sick?"

"Not sick, sick. Fucked up sick. FUBAR."

Is the loft bugged? Is she listening in on him? Who says FUBAR anymore? Except him, of course, and he hadn't said it in years, until this morning. Spelled it out, in fact, at full throttle. "FUBAR?"

"FUBAR," she repeats. She thinks she might be looking at him as if he weren't right in the head, although it's she who's not right in the head. "Fucked up beyond all recognition."

"Repair."

"What?"

"FUBAR means fucked up beyond all repair. Repair, not recognition."

"I hope I'm not beyond repair. Shit." She shakes her head and looks bleakly out the window. "Not with the amount of time and money I've invested in a psychiatrist."

If she'd said she was going to open a doll hospital or become a nun or gorge herself until she could run away and be the fat lady in the circus he wouldn't have been as shocked as he is now. Kate Beckett is seeing a shrink? Laying her soul bare to someone? Completely opening up? "You're in therapy?"

"You make it sound like it's a crime."

"No, no," he protests, looking in vain for some other kind of lifeline. "I was just, er, taken aback."

"I had to go after I was shot. Department regulations."

"Oh. Right. Understandable."

"Most cops go once. Over and out. I'm still there. Eight months now."

He's embarrassed, and floundering a bit, unsure of what he should say. What emerges is, "So you go every month?"

She has turned away from the window and is looking directly at him. "Not every month, every week. Sometimes when things are bad, like yesterday, I go more often than that."

Yesterday. Yesterday was when he and Slaughter had gone to the Twelfth. Oh. Was that what had made it a bad day for her? Enough to propel her to her therapist's office? "Sorry."

"Yeah, well." She looks at her feet.

Her living room feels suffocating. Between them, he thinks, they've sucked all the air out of it. The crackle of their argument is gone and there's a dead space between them.

"Look," he says.

"Look," she says, her word tumbling against his. Against all odds, they're still in synch.

"Go ahead, please."

"I was just going to say let's get back to the case, Castle. It felt like we were getting somewhere. Before."

Before. Right. "Okay." He stops and starts anew. "Do you have any food? I feel like I should put something in my stomach. Fuel my brain."

"Guess I should, too." Especially since she'd flushed away her already meager breakfast in the cafe rest room a few hours ago.

"What do you have?"

"You mean food?"

"Yes. Food. Stuff we eat three times a day. Or more, in my case."

"I might have some cheese." Her brow is furrowed.

"Is it from this century?"

"Probably not."

"Okay, let's order."

"Just a sandwich for me. Turkey, something like that. The deli across the street's pretty good. I'll call them."

He starts for the door. "No, I'll go. I'd like to get a little fresh air, such as it is. Turkey on rye? Lettuce and honey mustard?"

"Yeah. Thanks."

As soon as she hears the elevator doors open she drops onto the sofa. "He remembers my sandwich," she says to a pillow. She's shaky in the emotional aftermath of revealing that she's seeing a therapist. She hadn't planned to, it just happened. A lot of things just happen, even in her tightly-controlled life. Things happen. She loops back into their heated words a few minutes ago and realizes that she never answered his question, "Why didn't you say something?" Maybe she had, indirectly. She'd told him she was totally fucked up. That might explain it. She's too raw right now to tackle the question. Besides, they need to get ahead of this case before Slaughter puts Castle back on the battlefield without any weapon. Probably not even his bullet-proof vest. She can imagine what mockery that s.o.b. would make of that. WRITER.

Since Castle will be back any moment, she makes coffee, and is pouring it when he knocks on the door. "I got some chips, too," he says, walking past her. "I know your limit is usually one, but maybe you'll splurge if we figure this out."

They don't, but they do make a lot of headway. It's after 6:00 when they're interrupted by the sound of "Cowboys From Hell" on Castle's phone. The call, like the one Slaughter had made earlier today, is short.

"I've gotta go meet him," Castle says afterwards, sounding far less excited at the prospect than he would have a day ago.

"When?"

"Quarter to eight. Gotta go home and change though. He says wear all black."

"Really?"

"You know. Less chance of us being seen."

"Uh-huh." Her stomach lurches, and she's starting to regret the sandwich and half a bag of chips. "Where are you meeting him?"

"Hundred and fifty-fifth by the river."

Her stomach moves north. "You know that's a seriously high-crime area, right? So you'll be careful?"

"Not my first case, Beckett. Not even my first bad neighborhood."

"I know. Don't want it to be your last, either."

"Won't be." He's not at all sure, but he won't let on.

"I'll be watching."

"I'm too old for a baby-sitter."

"I'm not baby-sitting you, Castle, just being your back-up, all right? If you want to be mad about this, be mad at Gates."

He shoves the remains of their lunch in a paper bag and drops it in her kitchen wastebasket. "See ya, Beckett."

"I hope not. I'm supposed to be invisible."

"That'll be the day," he says, closing the door on his closing line.

Gates must have left the precinct a while ago, but Beckett knows she has to update her boss. After apologizing for calling at dinnertime, she tells Gates where Castle and Slaughter are meeting, and is rewarded with a low whistle. "Not a great spot, Detective," she says.

"That's what I told him, Sir."

"I'm not entirely enthusiastic about your riding alone. I'd like Ryan and Esposito nearby."

"You would?"

"Yes. I know full well they've been giving Mister Castle a little … help on this case. For a price, I imagine."

Whoa, Gates knows a lot more about their little group than she'd credited her for, but she had come out of IA. And she's smart. "Not money, Sir," Beckett adds feebly, feeling strongly that she should stand up for her boys.

"Of course not. Mister Castle has many other offerings."

"Yes, sir."

"My point, Detective, is that they have a good working knowledge of this case."

"And they have my back. And Castle's."

"Yes. I'll instruct them."

"Thank you, Sir."

"I remind you, though, not to tell any of them anything about the mayor or Finn Rourke."

"My lips are sealed."

She's relieved; she'll feel less apprehensive having the boys close at hand. She'll give Gates time to speak with them, and then she'll call. In the interim, she has to decide what to wear. It'll be black, all right, but nothing like Castle's outfit. This is not a jeans-and-turtleneck stake-out. No way. She stalks into her bedroom and uses a stepladder to get a box from the top shelf of her closet. After rummaging through it for several minutes, she nods approvingly at her selection, and gets dressed.

At 7:30, when the sun is a fat, fuzzy orange ball disappearing behind the buildings on the New Jersey side of the Hudson River, Beckett pulls up to the chain-link fence outside a small abandoned building that's home to a few junkies, a derelict car that's visible through a broken window—how the hell did anyone get that in there? she wonders as she waits—uncountable piles of garbage, and hundreds of rats. Shortly afterwards, Espo and Ryan cruise past and park at the corner about 50 yards in front of her. That's the signal for her to drive three blocks to the area where Castle and Slaughter will be. She's already picked the graffiti-covered overpass column that she'll use for cover. The shadows are deep there at virtually any time of day, and it's almost night now.

She doesn't have to wait long for them to arrive. Slaughter predictably puts his unmarked sedan—which looks like a beater but runs like a Jaguar—in front of a fire hydrant. She can see him animatedly talking to Castle, occasionally throwing his head back and laughing. Castle does not look amused. Slaughter puts his phone to his ear, apparently answering a call, and a moment later gets out of the paint-patched sedan. She tracks him as he walks up the front steps of a grubby brick building, fishes a key out of his pocket, yanks opens the door, and goes inside. So far, at least, Castle is staying put. But just as her anxiety level is beginning to dip she spies two lanky young men, almost certainly gangbangers and definitely packing, approach from the opposite direction and go into the building. It's still unlit and four alarms go off in her head.

Castle has never been armed, but she wonders if Slaughter had insisted on giving him a gun. And what if he has to use it? She weighs her options for only seconds before slipping out of the car, walking quietly to Castle's, and getting in the driver's seat.

"Beckett?" He's gaping at her.

"Shh."

"You changed."

"No kidding," she whispers, trying unsuccessfully to pull her black spandex mini skirt down to a marginally decent length.

"And you're blonde." Still gaping.

He sounds exactly the way he had when she'd pretended to be his Russian girlfriend at that Chinatown poker game a few years ago.

"Yes, I am. Listen. I don't like the look of this."

"Of what?" he says, staring at her sequined tube top.

"This situation, Castle. Are you armed?"

"Yeah."

He's a great target shooter, but that's not the same as using a gun if you're under attack from several sides, and that worries her, too. She brushes an errant strand of platinum fake hair away from her eye. "Who's in there with Slaughter?"

Before he can answer, if he even knows, four men burst out of the same front door that Slaughter had recently opened, and head straight for them. Even in the dim light, their tattoos are visible, and they're not pretty.

Castle doesn't even see her move, yet there she is in his lap, her knees squeezing his hips, her hands gripping his head. She's kissing him as though he were the only man on Earth. At the sound of a hand slapping the hood of the car—at least he thinks that's what it is, but his brain is addled—she presses herself hard against his chest. There's nothing between them but the fine Egyptian cotton of his shirt and the very thin fabric of her top, and he can feel her nipples pressing against his chest. And then she forces his lips open with her tongue. Her very wet, very insistent tongue meets his. His tongue has never been so happy.

"Sherlock?"

Holy hell, it's Slaughter. Castle opens his eyes; Beckett's are an inch away from his, and they're closed. She wiggles in his lap and moans.

"Sherlock?" Slaughter says again. What the fuck?"

TBC

 **A/N** See? I didn't forget about the kiss.


	5. Chapter 5

**Disclaimer:** The only part of _Castle_ that I own is the TV on which I watch the show.

 **A/N** I changed a few of the case details for the sake of this story and the KB-RC relationship.

" _Kто это_?" Her voice is sharp as she jerks her head in Slaughter's direction, glad that she had chosen to wear the bright blue contact lenses and the pink lipstick.

Castle has no clue what she's saying, but he wants her to do it again, without Slaughter in the background. Though if he hadn't shown up, Beckett wouldn't suddenly have become Russian. And if Slaughter hadn't come roaring out of that building, she wouldn't be in his lap, either, doing what she's been doing. Even in his befogged state, he recognizes the Sterling silver lining in the storm cloud that is Slaughter.

"Who is that?" she asks with a heavy Russian accent, translating her own question.

"Huh?" Her breath is still hot against his ear and she's pinching his bicep. "Oh, him? He's my partner."

"Your partner? You are gay, big boy?" Her eyes are wide and unbelieving as she pokes him in the middle of his sternum. "I do not think so. But him, maybe yes." Her faux platinum ringlets bounce when she tosses her head towards Slaughter, making sure that only a portion of her face is visible. "He is gay?"

"Me?" Slaughter shouts from a few feet away. "No fucking way, sweetheart."

"I am not your sweetheart," she shouts back. "But I think this one maybe is mine." She slaps Castle lightly on the cheek and winks at him. "He is rich man, no? Look at shirt." The top two buttons are undone, so she slips her hand through the open neck and begins to caress his chest. "Is nice, expensive shirt for nice, rich man." Wiggling on Castle's lap again, she waves her other hand dismissively at Slaughter. " _Yходи_. Go away."

"Beckett," Castle whispers desperately against her neck. "Sit still."

Slaughter's face is almost purple. "Get out of the car."

"Tell your partner we are busy," she instructs Castle. "We about to get very, very busy."

"Listen, Slaughter," he says. "It's a bit, uh, tricky for me to get up. I mean to get out, get out of the car, just now."

"I'll rip this damn door off if you don't, Sherlock. Who's the cowgirl riding your Levi's?"

"Svet—. She's Svetlana." Beckett rewards him with a squeeze of his thigh. "She surprised me while I was waiting for you and your—." He squints and peers through the windshield at the tattooed trio that's slouching in the background. "Who are those guys, anyway?"

"You just fall off the taco truck, hombre? They're Mexicans. I rounded 'em up because they're gonna help us nail Vales. They don't like him much. Now get that fine little Russian piece outta my car or I'll throw you both in the river. You can get a room later. Time's a wastin'."

"Gotcha." He reluctantly starts to lift Beckett-Svetlana from his lap, and she obligingly slides off. "Sorry. Sorry, baby," he says. Holy shit, he called her "baby." In other circumstances this would have horrible consequences, but not now. Definitely not now.

"Okay, okay. I go." Pouting, she puts her hand out, palm up, and snaps her fingers. "Where is my money?"

When had she had time to put on sparkly, electric-blue nail polish? And why hadn't he noticed it before? Oh, probably because he hadn't been looking at her hands. "Right. Um." Despite his general shakiness, he's able to extract his wallet from his back pocket, but before he can open it she grabs it and and removes five hundred-dollar bills. With both speed and expertise, she folds them in half and tucks them in her cleavage. Wow. If she'd taken $5,000 it wouldn't have been too much. He can still feel her tongue in his mouth.

She unlocks the door, pushes it open, and gives Slaughter her most blistering glare. Castle wonders if she's damaged the guy's corneas. Apparently not, because when she stalks by him on her four-inch platform heels he smiles lasciviously and swats her on the butt.

Castle freezes. Oh, not good. This is not good. So not good. Even in those shoes she can pivot like LeBron James, and she looks like she's about to take a three-point shot.

"You touch merchandise," she spits out as she wheels on Slaughter, "you pay."

Then, in a move that Castle has never seen anywhere and couldn't possibly either describe or duplicate, she trip-flips the butt slapper, who lands on his back in the dirt, the wind knocked out of him. Then she's gone. She disappears into a night that's darker than any that Castle's experienced in the city. It's not just the overcast sky: every street light and overhead bulb within 200 yards of them has been shot out. "Freaking Ninja," he says admiringly but inaudibly, savoring the aftertaste of her tongue. Before Slaughter has recovered sufficiently to stand and get in the car, Castle scoops up his wallet, which Beckett had dropped between his feet. As he shoves it in his pocket he discovers a Post-It note where the five bills had been. "BOYS at 154." Ryan and Espo are on 154th Street then, very nearby. So they're back-up, too. They're taking care of two of their own: Beckett and him. Wow again.

She's curled up on the floor in the back of her car, covered with a blanket on the slim chance that Slaughter might come looking for her. Her, Svetlana, not her, Beckett. Nice work, Castle, she thinks, smiling in the pitch black. Slaughter probably won't come, because he's hot to go after Vales, but she's prepared. If he doesn't, she'll hear him when he drives by, then climb into the front seat and follow. The boys will know when Slaughter moves, too, thanks to the tracking device that she'd slipped onto the underside of the fender before she'd slid across the front seat next to Castle.

Castle. Her fingertips brush her lips. She has a powerful afterimage of him, not on her retina but on her body. She can still feel the press of him, and she's sure that there must be an outline of him on her clothes, as if it had been burned in. It had felt like that. Scorching. He was so—. She pauses mid thought to relive the kiss. He was so _responsive_. That kiss. God, that man can kiss, even though she'd ambushed him. He'd ambushed her once, too, with a kiss. Last year, when they'd been trying to distract a guard so they could rescue Ryan and Espo. That kiss, that untalked-about kiss, had been amazing, but this kiss was something else. She won't lock this kiss away in a box and put it on a shelf as she had the other one. She wishes this one had gone on forever, or at least until they could leave for her apartment and tear each other's clothes off. She's getting warm thinking about it when she hears a car kick up some gravel and drive south. It's Slaughter, Castle, and presumably the three others, unless they have a ride of their own. She hadn't seen another car and doesn't hear one now, so probably not. Before turning the key in the ignition, she puts a blouse and jacket on over the tube top. At the first red light, she removes the wig and shakes out her hair; three lights after that she takes out the contact lenses, wipes off her lipstick, and nods to her reflection in the rear-view mirror. "Bye, Svetlana."

"Nice neighborhood," Ryan says. The two detectives been driving parallel to Slaughter for some time, and they pull to the curb when the tracking device indicates that the other car has turned left, towards them, and stopped. They get out and peer down the quiet, tree-lined street of four- and five-story houses that were built more than a century ago. Unlike most brownstones in Manhattan, these haven't been divided into apartments. This is a big-bucks block, very big.

"Everyone here's a crook," Espo says sourly, leaning against a projecting wall that offers them cover as well as a good view of Slaughter's car.

"How d'you figure that? I bet most of them are lawyers and stockbrokers."

"That's my point, bro. Crooks."

"Harsh," Ryan says. "Hey, there's Beckett." She'd found a space on the same street but one block west, and they catch sight of her ducking behind a dumpster. The three of them have effectively boxed in Slaughter now, but they have no intention of stopping him unless things get out of control. "You know, it still pisses me off that we have to help Castle, the way he's been behaving."

Espo shrugs. "Just think of it as helping Beckett."

"Yeah. Wait, they're moving. What is that, a clown car? Three guys just got out of the back seat. And there's Slaughter."

"Castle's riding shotgun. Looks like he's staying put."

Castle is indeed staying put. Partly because Slaughter had told him that he might have to drive, and partly because he's scared shitless. When he'd asked the three gangbangers their names, Slaughter had sneered and answered for them. "José uno, dos, and tres." He'd decided not to pursue it. The three of them are flanking the front entrance to the house, but standing in the shadows. After Slaughter rings the bell and says something in Spanish, a man opens the door; he hits the floor hard when Slaughter coldcocks him with a meaty fist. Castle wonders if he'd considered restoring his pride by using Beckett's—Svetlana's—move on the guy. Nah. Besides, he must want him unconscious, whoever he is.

"Twenty bucks says it'll take two minutes, fifteen seconds," Espo says to his partner when the four men enter the house.

" 'til they come out with Vales?"

"Yeah. Or 'til Castle gets out of the car."

"Three minutes," Ryan counters, starting the stopwatch on his phone.

They'd underestimated Slaughter. One minute, forty-nine seconds later five men emerge. When they reach the sidewalk, three take off on foot, and Slaughter hauls the handcuffed and complaining Vales to the car.

"Gimme a hand here, Sherlock," the detective says, popping open the trunk.

Castle joins him, wiping his palms on his jeans. "What am I supposed to do?"

"Pick up his feet, genius, and help me dump him in here."

"In there?"

"Yeah, in there. It's a hell of a lot better than having him carrying on in the back, kicking our asses through the seats."

"But—"

"You want me to put you in there with him?"

"No."

"Then pick up his feet. And hey, Vales? Shut up or you'll be riding somewhere worse than the trunk."

Worse than the trunk? Castle doesn't want to contemplate what that could be. "You're on your own for this one," he says, and turns around.

"Remind me to buy you that skirt," Slaughter says to the retreating Castle, as he heaves Vales into the trunk and slams the lid. "Maybe even a dress."

"That dude is seriously nuts," Ryan mumbles at the corner, handing Espo 20 dollars. "Think they're going to the Twelfth?"

"Dunno. Could be. Let's roll."

In the next minute, three car engines start, and the unlikely caravan—two unmarkeds secretly following another—head downtown. "Where are are we going?" Castle asks over the loud and irregular drumbeat of a pair of handmade boots in the trunk.

"Your place," Slaughter says.

"My place? Are you kidding me? My mother's there. More to the point, so's my daughter, doing her homework."

"You still live with your mother?" He cackles. "That explains a lot."

"Technically, she lives with me."

"Uh huh."

"Under no circumstances are we going to my place."

"Look who grew a pair all of a sudden! Good for you, Sherlock. For the record, I didn't mean your apartment, I meant your workplace. As in where you work."

"Nooo. After we interrogated Shea there yesterday Beckett was totally pissed off. She told me it wasn't my place to let you use the room."

"Oooh, bossy. You must like that in a woman. I still don't know why you're not tapping her, best natural resource in the department. She's like the hot springs of the NYPD."

If Castle could have throttled Slaughter without causing a crash that would almost certainly kill them both, he'd have done it. Instead he seethes. In fact, the Twelfth is the best place for them. Since Gates had put Beckett on the case, even if it was sub rosa, she could hardly object to having Slaughter there, could she? Well, yes, she could, and she probably would, just for show. Might as well give it a try, see what happens. Put up a front for the lunatic next to him. Besides, it's late and Gates probably went home hours ago. "What the hell. You're right. I don't answer to Beckett."

"Good to see I'm rubbing off on you, Sherlock. Helping you man up."

It's clear to the occupants of the other cars that Slaughter is going to the Twelfth. Beckett puts her cell in the cradle and calls Ryan. "Hey, guys?"

"Hi, Beckett."

"Looks like they're going to the precinct, right?"

"Right."

"I'm going to cut over to the West Side Highway to pick up some time. I want to be there ahead of them, okay?"

"Okay."

"And let me know asap if they head somewhere else?"

"You got it."

She not only takes the fast route, she uses the portable flashing light to insure that the rest of the ride will be almost stop-free. She's still wearing the micro miniskirt when she arrives at the station, but at least the rest of her is covered up. The sergeant at the desk gives her a look when she walks through the first floor to the elevator.

"Evening, Detective."

"Evening, Sarge."

"You thinking of working Vice again?"

"You never know." As the elevator doors close she gives him a grin. She loves Flanagan. He's an institution. And he'd helped her with her father more than once, back in the day. Every year on the anniversary of her mother's death he leaves a red rose on her desk. She goes immediately to the locker room, which is empty at the moment, thank God. She wiggles out of the skirt, toes off her shoes, and trades them for black pants and boots. In the ladies' room she quickly removes Svetlana's makeup and applies mascara and a little blush. Good, she's ready.

When Slaughter, Castle, and the vocal Vales come out of elevator, she's seated at her desk with a fat file open in front of her.

"Beckett?" Castle yelps. "What are you doing here?"

"I work here," she says icily. Oh my God, look at his eyes. They're so blue, and so wide open. And oh, his mouth. Is it her imagination, or are his lips a little swollen? If they are, what about hers?

"Isn't your shift over?"

"Apparently it slipped your mind, since you're so busy with your new sidekick, that I'm prepping for a trial. I've got a lot to do. And what the hell are you doing here, Slaughter? Don't you have your own place to take your suspect, or whoever he is?"

"I like this one. Scenery's good."

"Are you planning to interrogate him here? Because I thought I made it clear to Castle yesterday that that wasn't going to happen again."

"Well, unless you got promoted to captain in the last couple of hours, I don't think I have to take orders from you," he says cheerfully.

The elevator doors scrape open and again, revealing Esposito and Ryan.

"Hi, guys," Castle says. "You're working late."

"Chasing a lead," Ryan says.

"Dead end," Espo adds, glowering.

"Castle?" Beckett says, standing up. "Before you help yourself to our interrogation room again, I'd like a word." She hopes she sounds furious. She nods to the small conference room and walks commandingly there, Castle in her wake. "Sit down," she says, pointing to a hard-back chair. Once he does, she shuts the door, closes the blinds of the small window, and lowers her voice. "Svetlana, huh? Good thinking, Castle."

She's smiling at him, really smiling. "Thanks."

"Some detective Slaughter is. He didn't even know who I was."

"Yeah, well." Castle smiles back. "He might have been a little distracted by your, um, outfit."

"As distracted as you?"

"I hope not."

"I'm going back to my desk now."

"You are?"

"I am. But before I do, Svetlana asked me to do this." She leans over, kisses him hard and long on the mouth, then nips his ear and strides to the door. She yanks the door open. "And I mean it, Castle," she says, looking ferocious as she turns to Slaughter and waits for her partner to walk past her.

"Slaughter? He's all yours. And don't make a mess of our room."

TBC

 **A/N** Thank you, everyone. I apologize for having taken a little longer than usual to update, but life has been very busy lately. It should calm down after Monday. Have a great weekend, and to all of you who observe Easter or Passover, enjoy the holiday.


	6. Chapter 6

From the other side of the glass, Espo, Ryan, and Beckett are watching Slaughter and Castle interrogate Vales, though Slaughter's the only one talking. Castle is being unnaturally silent, and Vales is unresponsive, at least for the moment. They've been there only a couple of minutes when Beckett gasps, jumps up, and almost knocks over her chair in her rush to get out, leaving Espo and Ryan to exchange puzzled looks.

She returns almost as quickly as she'd departed, carrying a bag of cotton balls and a plastic bottle. While Slaughter continues to strut and bluster, she removes her sparkly nail polish, finger by finger, surreptitiously monitored by Ryan.

"I want my lawyer," Vales says while she's swabbing her right thumbnail.

"Can't believe he held out this long," she says, screwing the top back on the bottle before dropping the damp blob of cotton into the wastebasket. "I think that's our cue to leave."

"What's with that?" Ryan asks, pointing to her newly bare nails.

"This?" She blows lightly on her fingertips. "I forgot all about it until right after we came in here. I was afraid that Slaughter might notice my manicure and put two and two together."

"He saw you?" Ryan looks shocked. "In your hooker get-up? How'd that happen?"

"Never mind. Suffice it to say he didn't recognize me."

"Guy's such a douche," Espo says in disgust, as he quietly opens the door. The three of them walk quickly to the elevator before Slaughter and Castle can find out that they'd been watched. Out on the street they go in three different directions; she heads for the subway. Standing on the platform, she wonders if she should have hung around for Castle, but decides not to torment herself. Anything she wants and needs to say to him can wait until tomorrow, or until the case is closed, or both. Besides, it's late. She doesn't want to talk to him when she's this tired.

Once she's home she washes her face, brushes her teeth, and changes into a SIZZLING HEAT tee shirt. She'd won it in the Nikki Heat Fan Club Facebook page trivia contest under the name QT Patooty, one that she'd chosen because Castle would never, ever guess that it was she. She'd even borrowed a friend's mailing address, just in case. Because she'd come in first—surprise!—he'd signed it. In indelible ink. She smoothes her hand over the signature, which is directly over her left breast, and turns out the light. She's just drifting off when her phone chirps with an incoming text; she groans and rolls over to pick it up. It's Castle. Of course.

"Is Svetlana there?"

She smiles while she types. "Nyet. She went home to Brighton Beach."

"You have her number?"

"Unlisted. Classified. Can't give it to you."

Here come the bubbles. "She took 500 bucks from my wallet."

"You want your money back?"

There's a longer pause. "No. I wanted to tell her that she's priceless."

Until the last year or so, she hadn't blushed since middle school. Now she gets red-cheeked almost at the thought of him. Before she can compose either herself or a response, he texts again.

"If you speak to her, tell her I said Cпокойной но́чи."

Her face is flushed, but she also has a lump in her throat. He must have looked up how to say "good night" in Russian, which she finds oddly touching.

"Night to you, too, Castle." She adds a little _Zzzzz_ emoticon, hits send, and puts the phone back on top of her book. A minute later she retrieves it. "Sweet dreams," she adds, and holds on. There he is.

"Only kind I'll have."

"Me, too," she whispers into the dark room. She falls asleep with the phone in her hand.

So does he.

Castle doesn't come into the precinct in the morning since he's working with Slaughter, who remains convinced that Vales is the killer. Castle doesn't believe it and neither does Beckett, especially since she has traffic-cam video (thank you, Ryan) of Vales's car nowhere near the scene of the crime at the appropriate time. She's working the case at her desk and she's itching to call him. Yearning, aching, panting. But she can't, not yet. After a late lunch of two iced coffees and a one-ounce box of raisins that she found in her desk drawer, probably left over from several Hallowe'ens ago—her trick-or-treaters had been far more interested in the mini Snickers bars—she makes a breakthrough. She grabs the photos of the spot where Reilly's body had been found, underneath an overpass. She'd looked at them before, but while she chewed the very dry raisins she realized that though the area appeared to be brightly lit, all the illumination was from CSU equipment. She studies the photos again: it's obviously a high-crime neighborhood, and under ordinary circumstances almost certainly just as dark as the spot where they'd been last night. All the bits and pieces she and Castle had gathered but couldn't quite stitch together, and here it is. Reilly was hiding. Waiting for help, maybe. It was dark. The gangbangers who were after him wouldn't have seen him, just as Slaughter hadn't seen her when she'd been hiding by a pillar under the overpass last night.

She has to call Castle, this minute. Trouble is, he has a ringtone for her, and it's a giveaway: an old Donna Summer song, "Hot Stuff." She can't text or call from her cell. What about Ryan's? She has to think for a minute about what Castle uses to ID him. Aha, she's got it: the theme from an old soap, "Ryan's Hope." No way Slaughter will recognize that. She gets up and goes to Ryan's desk.

"Could I use your cell for a minute, please?"

"Sure," he says, pulling it out of his pocket. "Your battery dead?"

"No, it's fine. But I have to text Castle, and the ringtone he uses for me—." Shit, she doesn't want to tell him what it is. Too embarrassing. "Uh, I have to text him about the case and Slaughter will probably know that it's me."

Ryan's blue eyes light up. "Because it's 'Hot Stuff'?"

"What? You knew that?"

"Everyone knows it, Beckett," Espo says cheerfully.

She covers her face with her hands and shakes her head before saying anything else. "That does it. Next time I see him I'm taking the goddamn phone away from him and deleting that freaking song. It's not like I haven't asked him a thousand times."

"Beckett?"

"What?"

"You're blushing."

"I'm not _blushing_ , Esposito. If my face is red it's because I'm irritated."

"Okay. If you say so."

She stomps back to her desk and stabs a text to Castle.

"It's Beckett on Ryan's phone. Pretend I'm your mother—and no wisecracks PLEASE—and call me back. Tell Slaughter you have to step away, wherever you are, and talk to her for a minute."

She'd expected him to respond immediately. He always does. How long could it take him, anyway? Twenty minutes, that's how long.

"Hi, Mother. Just got your message."

"Please tell me you're alone."

"I will be in a minute." There's some muffled noise. "Hello. What can I do for you, Mother?"

"Cut the crap, Castle."

"What a way to talk to your son."

"Castle!"

"Sorry. So, what's up?"

"Break in the case."

"Seriously?"

"Yes. We need to go to the crime scene. Can you get away from the Widowmaker?"

"I'll say I have to go home."

"I'll pick you up in front of your building. Half an hour."

"Okay."

It's only 4:30, long before sunset, when they park beneath the overpass, but it's pouring and gloomy and as dark as a tomb.

"There had to be a reason he stood under here instead of running down into the subway, right?" She's pointing down the block. "He didn't want the Mexican guys who were chasing him to see him."

"Okay," Castle nods. "So, he's on the run, and he needs someone to help. Who's he gonna call?"

"His father?"

"Yeah, but there was no cell on him, so how could he have?"

"Look, look," she says unconsciously gripping his arm. "Across the street. Pay phone. How about that?"

"Worth checking. Amazing that there's still one here."

"I'm calling Ryan. He should be able to find out if anyone phoned from there around the time of the murder."

She speaks briefly with the detective. "He says he should have it in an hour," she says. "What number or numbers were called from there, if any."

"Wanna head back to the precinct?"

"No. What I really want to do is get coffee. I'm freezing. Doesn't feel like April."

"That's why it's called the cruelest month, Beckett."

She shrugs. "I like Edna St. Vincent Millay's vision better than T. S. Eliot's."

He tries not to react. She likes poetry? Why hadn't he known that? He wants to burst into song. "Yeah?" He tries to sound casual. "What exactly did she have to say about it?"

"Exactly?" she asks, buckling her seat belt. "Lemme see." She scrunches her eyes shut.

"Beautiful Dove, come back to us in April.  
Come back to us, be with us in the spring.  
If we can learn to grow the grain you feed on,  
You might be happy here, might even sing."

He looks sideways at her. She's gorgeous even in this grim, grimy light. "That's beautiful."

"It is."

"It's hopeful."

"That surprise you, Castle? That I like something hopeful?"

"Maybe a little."

She turns and gives him a brief, dazzling smile. "I've been feeling kinda hopeful lately."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah." She makes a sharp turn. "There's a coffee shop I like. Parking space right in front, too. My lucky day."

Mine, too, he thinks. When they're in a booth, each with a mug of coffee, he asks what he's wanted to ask ever since she'd called him. "So. Speaking of Ryan. Which we were a minute ago."

"We were? I thought we were talking about poetry a minute ago."

"Okay, a few minutes ago. You called Ryan."

"I'm glad hanging around with Slaughter hasn't impaired your short-term memory, Castle."

"I was wondering why you called me on his cell and not yours." He nods at the phone that she put down next to her spoon. "Yours is working."

"You're a smart guy. See if you can figure that one out all on your own."

It takes him three sips of surprisingly good coffee before he gets it. "Oh. 'Hot Stuff'."

"Bingo. I knew Slaughter might guess it was me. If you don't change that ringtone right now, I'll confiscate your phone."

"No need to threaten me." He grabs his phone, works on it briefly, and returns it to his pocket. "Done."

"You gonna tell me what it is?"

"Nope."

"Fine." She picks up her phone, calls him, and laughs. "The Isley Brothers. 'Busted.' Good one, Castle. You're quick."

"Only when it counts, Beckett. I like to take some things very slowly." He looks innocently at her. "May I have the cream, please?"

If she hadn't already finished her latte, she might have choked to death. Her phone buzzes: it's Ryan, and for the first time ever she's grateful for his interruption.

"Beckett." The rest of her end of the conversation consists of "Mm hmm. Mm. Wow. You're sure? Thanks, Ryan, great work," spread over two minutes. She ends the call. "We were right, Castle. Reilly called his father from the pay phone."

"And? Because that doesn't sound like all you got."

"And we have video from the subway down the block, before and after the TOD. Want to guess who it was?"

"Dear Old Dad? Pride of the Westies?"

"You got it."

"No, we got it. Slaughter will be pissed."

"Probably, Castle. But even he doesn't want the wrong man to go to prison, does he?"

"Good point."

"Let's go. We have a case to wrap up. Ryan and Espo are bringing in Reilly Senior. You want to call your partner and have him meet us?"

He stares long and hard at the formica tabletop before meeting her eyes. "Doesn't make any sense to call my partner, since I'm looking at her. But I'll call Slaughter." He drops a $10 bill on the table, starts walking to the door, and makes the call. They're only a few minutes from the Twelfth, and ride there silently.

Castle watches through the glass as Beckett and Slaughter interrogate Brian Reilly, who puts up no defense.

"All those years, all those screw-ups," Slaughter says. "Must have been unbearable for a stand-up guy like you, huh?"

"And then he calls you to tell you that he screwed up again," Beckett adds, leaning in. "But this time it was different, wasn't it?"

"He'd crossed the line," the ungrieving father says. "He was my responsibility. So I did what had to be done. He wasn't even surprised. 'Twas if he'd been waiting for it his whole life."

It's a cold-blooded confession, as cold-blooded as the murder of his flesh and blood.

"Nice collar," Slaughter says bitterly a few minutes later, after Reilly has been taken away.

"Your collar, too," she says. "We'll share it."

They exchange cool stares. Finally he nods, and leaves. He doesn't say thanks, or goodbye, but he does raise his hand a few inches, in a grudging sort of salute.

When the elevator has carried him down, Beckett checks her watch. "Time to go home."

"Long day," Castle says. "Long day. Time for me to go home, too."

Her eyebrows rise and her eyes widen. "You're going home?"

"Well, yeah."

"I meant it was time for you to go home with me."

TBC

 **A/N** My life has calmed down at last, and I hope to post the next chapter over the weekend. Thank you, everyone.


	7. Chapter 7

**A/N** This chapter changes to an M rating for a while near the end. If you're uncomfortable with that, stop reading after the line "She leans back and smiles" and begin again at "Oh, my God," she says. "You. I'm. I've."

 **Disclaimer:** The only part of _Castle_ that I own is the TV on which I watch the show.

"Home? With you?"

"We didn't get to finish our conversation when you were there yesterday."

"Oh." Conversation. A one-word substitute for the dreaded _we need to talk_.

For an instant he'd looked stunned, and stunned had morphed into what seemed—at least to her—delighted, but now he looks miserable, as if he's dreading going to her place. What has she done? She suddenly feels as defeated as he is deflated, as though she's lost her last friend. "I don't know how I keep screwing this up," she says.

"Screwed what up?"

At least he said something, even if he sounds genuinely confused. "This," she says. "Us." She looks down at the floor and shakes her head. "Please, Castle. I promise I won't bite or put poison in your coffee."

"We're having coffee?"

"We always have coffee." She's pleading with him. She'll get down on her knees and beg if she has to. "Please."

"Okay."

That's enough for now, his okay, even if it seems like resignation.

For the third time in less than 48 hours—and the third time in the three-plus years since they met—they're utterly silent in the car. They're silent as they ride the rattly elevator in her building; silent as they walk down the hall to her apartment; silent as they hang their jackets on her coat rack.

"Coffee?" she asks awkwardly, the word thick in her mouth.

"No."

"No?"

"No if you make it. Yes if I make it."

"Fine," she says weakly. "I'll get the cups." That's the end of their scintillating chat until the coffee is ready. "Why don't you sit down in the living room, and I'll bring it in." Her hands are trembling as she carries everything in on a tray.

"Huh," he says when she puts it down. "You really chose cups. I thought that was just an expression. 'Would you like a cup of coffee?' When you're actually going to drink it from a mug."

"Would you rather have a mug? I can get you one." God, this is depressing. She's even got the china wrong.

"No, this is fine. I'm just surprised."

She sits on her hands and tries to calm down. "Since this is something of a confessional, I'll confess that I'm so nervous that I deliberately chose cups. I figured if I spilled my coffee it would land in the saucer instead of my lap." He doesn't comment. Why doesn't he? Why doesn't the man who jabbers nonstop in the chair by her desk, day after day, say something? He's just looking at her, and her detective skills definitely need sharpening because she can't read him at all. There's no there there, and she's sure that's intentional. He doesn't want to give her any clues. She's on her own, and she takes a deep breath before launching herself into uncertain waters.

"So. Yesterday. After I figured out why things changed after the bombing case—which is entirely on me—and we talked about it, you asked me why I never said anything afterwards, after last summer. Why I never asked you if you really loved me. I told you that I was seeing a psychiatrist because I'm so fucked up. But that's as far as I got. We got." She pauses to drink some coffee, some of which does, indeed, slop into the saucer. "You know, before I got shot I'd never have gone to a shrink."

"No kidding," he says, though it sounds less cold than the words themselves. Physically he's still Mount Rushmore. Expressionless.

"Even my mother's case, right? My mother's case alone should have sent me to the couch a long time ago, but I refused." It's time for her to take another deep breath, a very deep one for the deep water she's heading into. "What I'm trying to say is that what's kept me going back all these months is you." She attempts a little smile. "But not because you drive me crazy, Castle."

Him? She's in therapy because of him? If he weren't already sitting down, he'd fall over. The only response he can push out is, "Me?"

"It's about love. I want you to love me, but how can you if I'm still so screwed up?" She gets up from the sofa, looks out the window for several excruciating few seconds, and sits back down. "You've been married, you're charming and successful and rich. You're a great Dad. I've never had a relationship that lasted even six months. I don't have kids. Don't even have a goldfish. Do you remember what you said to me, right in this room, before Captain Montgomery died? You said I'd crawled inside my mother's murder and didn't come out. You said I hid there the same way I hid in nowhere relationships with men I don't love."

He'd held up reasonably well until that, but now he flinches. He remembers what he'd said, word for word, but he's astonished that she does, too. They'd both been furious. And then? Well, then things had gotten worse, and then they'd gotten better, and then they'd fallen apart, and now she's trying to pull herself together. For him? Because she loves him? He wants to tell her to stop talking, just stop talking for a minute, but he can see that she needs to keep going.

"I felt like you'd slapped me across the face, Castle. But you were right. No one else dared say that to me, about hiding in my mother's case or hiding in relationships that were going nowhere. Partly my fault, partly theirs. But the point is they didn't love me enough to say it, didn't want to get close enough to me to say that—maybe I didn't let them in, I know—but you do. That's what I realized. You know when you went out and got my sandwich yesterday? I didn't have to tell you what I wanted, because you knew. Exactly. Even the honey mustard."

His mouth finds a way around his brain, and he blurts out, "Stonewall Kitchen."

"Yes, Stonewall Kitchen honey mustard. It's stupid that that matters to me, but it does. Until you, the only people who ever noticed or cared what kind of sandwich I like were my parents."

Is she aware that she's alternating between rubbing her palms hard down her thighs and holding one flat against her ear? He's never seen stress manifest itself this way, certainly not in her.

"So many times I was going to tell you that I remembered. How I feel. I was just about to do it at the bombing case. I don't know, maybe that's why I said what I did to Bobby Lopez. I hadn't planned to. Thanks, subconscious."

Her right hand just moved to her temple, shoving hard against it. She probably doesn't know that, either. How she can look intense, distracted, and agonized at the same time? It's obvious, at least to him, that she's fighting tears.

"I can't say I'm sorry enough, Castle. I can't apologize enough. I just hope that you understand, even if you have a hard time forgiving. When I finally figured out why you'd taken off during the bombing case—it was in the coffee shop yesterday. It just all fell into place, and I —."

She stops. Just stops and looks down at her lap.

"That's why you looked so pale, isn't it? When you came out of the bathroom. I said you looked like you'd seen a ghost and you said 'I did'."

Her head jerks up. "You heard me?"

"Yes, I did."

"You didn't—you didn't say anything."

"I decided to leave it for the moment."

She pauses again, maybe digesting what he'd said before she picks up her thread again. "When it all came crashing in on me I thought, oh, Jacinda. That explains Jacinda. And Slaughter, too. Uncomplicated Jacinda and complicated me. Complicated, completely fucked up me."

She's lost the war with tears, which are spilling out in such quantity and at such speed that he doesn't know why she isn't choking.

"I want not to be that way. That's why I'm doing all this therapy. Because I love you and I want you to be able to love me the way I love you, as much as I love you, and I don't know that it's possible."

Last fall, when she'd come back, she'd talked to him about her wall. That freaking wall. But when told him a moment ago that she loves him, his own wall began to crack and give way, the wall he'd hastily put up between them two weeks ago. He loves her, she loves him. SHE LOVES HIM. Loves him so much that she's doing something, therapy, that must feel like evisceration to her. Like she's begin sliced open and her heart is being ripped out. Kind of like what literally happened to her last year. Jesus. What have they done?

He turns until he's facing her head on, then puts his hands in her hair and kisses her. Keeps on kissing until she begins to kiss back, then deepens his kiss and she deepens hers. He pulls away and whispers into her ear, "I love you." He whispers it again in the hollow between her collarbones. Whispers it into her ear and her neck and finally into her mouth, which sets off another round of kissing, during which, at some point, she crawls into his lap. Her thighs are bracketing his, and with each kiss she moves incrementally closer, presses herself incrementally harder against him until she pulls away.

"You know what else you said to me that day?"

"What day?"

"The day you came over here and told me to stop my mother's case. You said that we kissed and never talked about it. It's true. And not a day goes by without my thinking about that kiss. You know what I play all the time when I'm home alone? Sinatra. Sinatra singing 'As Time Goes By.' Top thing on my iTunes list. Hold on." She turns without getting up, and grabs her phone from the coffee table. "Listen."

 _You must remember this,  
_ _A kiss is still a kiss,  
_ _A sigh is just a sigh,  
_ _The fundamental things apply  
_ _As time goes by._

She mutes the phone and drops it onto a sofa cushion. "Last night I went to sleep thinking about the kiss we'd just had in the car. Should we talk about it now?"

"I don't think we have to, do you?"

"No. Besides, this was better, wasn't it?"

"Oh, much. So much better that it's unquantifiable."

She buries her face in his neck for a long time. "But I'm sorry. I'm sorry that I held it in and didn't tell you and held on to a lie. I'm sorry."

"Beckett. Kate. Kate, Kate." He pulls her chin up so that's he's looking into her eyes. "I know you are. And I don't want you to wear a hair shirt about this. Okay? Got that?"

"Hair shirt, huh?" she mumbles, after another long wait.

"Right. You're repenting. No hair shirt."

She leans back and smiles. "Good. Because I was thinking of wearing no shirt at all. What do you think?" She's undoing the row of buttons. "Is that all right with you?" She shrugs off her blouse and drops it on top of her silenced cell phone. "Or bra. No bra, either."

The blue, lace-edged confection lands on top of the blouse, while her breasts brush against his own shirt. Her perfect breasts that he's devouring with his eyes. To hell with that, he wants to devour them for real, and he takes one in his mouth. The harder he sucks on it, the harder her nipple is against his tongue, the sensitive, pebbled skin rubbing against his palate. She's moaning; it's beautiful, it's the most beautiful sound he's heard in ages. She's also moving, both under and over him.

"Take me to bed, Castle." It's a very husky request that's accompanied by a highly erotic undulation.

"Are you sure?" His hand is cupping one buttock.

"Am I sure?" She's gasping.

"That you're ready for this?"

"Can't you tell?"

"Just checking."

Halfway to the bedroom, with her legs wrapped around his waist, she asks, "Are you sure you're ready?"

"Can't you tell?"

She giggles and squeezes her feet together at the small of his back. "Just checking."

All of his clothes and the remainder of hers are on the floor in seconds, and immediately after that the two of them fall onto the bed. "God, you're beautiful," he says, kissing her again as he rolls her onto her back and pushes her legs apart with his knee.

"You, too." She tries to circle his bicep with one hand. No way.

His fingertips begin to drag through the slickness on the inside of her thigh. "You weren't kidding about being ready."

"Neither were you," she says, taking him in her hand and rubbing her thumb over his tip. She lets go only because his tongue has replaced his finger, which are now elsewhere, very gently but enthusiastically probing. "Castle. Castle."

"Hmm."

"I know you said you like to take some things slowly, but please, not now. Later, not now. Next time." She can hardly breathe.

"Next time? You promise?" His relentless tongue and fingers go back to work, and he uses his left hand to hold her in place.

"Yes. I promise. Please."

He doesn't stop, and doesn't change speeds.

"Castle. You're driving me crazy."

"Thought I already did that."

"I'm going to explode."

More tongue. And teeth. "Now you know how I felt yesterday," he says from between her knees, "when you were wriggling indecently in my lap."

"Indecent's what I want now, Castle."

"So bossy."

"Remember the Mistress Venom case?"

"Mmmpphh."

He's still working her up; her heartbeat must be 150, and it's difficult to have a coherent thought. "Remember the video you and the boys were looking at? Said how was that position even possible? It is. I'll show you, later. I can do it, we can do it, if you'll just get moving. Really moving."

Propelling himself on his elbows, he slides up her body until they're nose to nose. "Like this?" He begins to enter her.

"Yes. Yes, yes."

"Like this?" He thrusts all the way in, withdraws, and thrusts again.

"Yesyesyesyes. Harder."

She can't believe how strong he is. The biceps should have been a giveaway, but she hadn't quite registered because she was too busy taking in the rest of him. God, he's huge. Huge and bold but totally attentive. She's vaguely aware of him lifting her up slightly to change his own angle, and then it's staggering. She's never felt anything like it. She'd told him that she wanted hard and fast, but now she wants this to go on and on. This changes everything she'd ever thought about sex.

He's pounding into her and it's thrilling. It's a drug, and he wants more. He's never known a woman with legs as powerful as hers. The combination of them, her hands gripping his ass, urging him forward, and now her interior muscles gripping him, is unlike anything he's experienced. And her mouth! When it's not on him it's making unintelligible, guttural noises that go straight to his balls. And her language? He'll have to ask her what some of those words mean, if he still has any working brain cells.

She's trying to hold off her orgasm but she can't. He's not just filling her body but overwhelming every one of her senses. She screams full out, and she's a goner.

He'd known that she was almost there, and he'd thought that he was prepared, but when she comes she's like a wild thing, and the force of it, of her, is too much to withstand for long. Three deep thrusts and he's gone, too, and their orgasms finish at the same time. Perfect. They're perfect together. Two heaving, breathless, sweaty, magnificent bodies.

She finds her voice first. "Oh, my God. You. I'm. I've."

"Same here," he says, before rolling over and pulling her onto his chest. "Never."

After a few minutes, they begin to talk. And talk and talk. Some of it is funny and some of it is serious; some of it is sweet and some of it is demanding. It's all important, every bit. They've been quiet for a little while when he says, "Kate? I want to make love to you."

"Me, too," she says, cradling his jaw. "I want to make love to you."

And they do. It's totally unlike the first time, and every bit as astonishing.

He wakes up and checks his watch. It's not quite 5 a.m.; there's probably another hour of darkness. He looks at her for a long time and thinks about what she'd said just before they'd fallen asleep. "I'm so happy, Castle. I'm so happy. Thank you." He'd stayed awake for a while, and as soon as he'd been sure that she was out he let himself cry. He's happy, too.

Very carefully he gets out of bed, walks to the bathroom, and quietly shuts the door. On his way back out he accidentally knocks off something that had been draped on the doorknob. He picks it up to return it to the knob when something catches his eye. He takes a step backwards, shuts the door, and turns the light back on. Holy shit. It's an autographed SIZZLING HEAT tee shirt. _The_ autographed tee shirt. The only one. He buries his face in it; it smells of her.

"Beckett!" He runs into the room and jumps on the bed. "Beckett!"

"What? What's wrong?" She sits straight up, and the sheet slips off her.

"Nothing's wrong. Everything's right." He waves the tee shirt. "You're QT Patooty?"

"Yeah." She gives him a smile he's never seen before. It's huge and loving. "I am."

He wraps her in a hug. "Best morning of my life."

"Mine too, Castle. Mine, too."

 **A/N** That's the end of this adventure. Thanks to everyone who came along, especially those who followed and favorited and took the time to review. I'm so glad that you've stuck around, even though the show hasn't.


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